Blank with signature-controlling indicia



(No Model.)

B. A. DUBEY. BLANK WITH SIGNATURBYGONTROLLING INDIGIA.

Patented June 28, 1892.

FOR ANY WARD.

.BQiZ kMuIn/ZMLYHNH [PENSION VOUCHER] 4 (WI-Hum wk cm a 11:10:]

WIT/VESSEL? UNITED I STATES PATENT OFFICE.

EDWARD A. DUBEY OF BROOKLYN, NEW YORK.

BLANK WITH SIGNATURE-CONTROLLING lNDIClA.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 477,744, dated June 28, 1892.

Application filed February 12, 1891. Serial No. 381,168. (No specimens.)

To all whom it may concern.-

Be it known that I, EDWARD A. DUBEY, a citizen of the United States, residing at Brooklyn,in the county of Kings and State of New York, have invented a certain new and useful Improvement in Blanks with Signature-(Jontrolliug Indicia, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description. I

The object of this invention is to provide documentary blanks that have to be signed by two or more sets or classes of persons with such indicia as to place of signature and as to who shall sign at such place as will pre vent the mistakes that so commonly occur in the execution of various kinds of legal and other documents.

In carrying out my invention in its simplest form I cover the place of signature of one class of signers with one color and the place of signature of the other class of signers with a different color, the two colors being so distinct as to appeal at once to the eye and catch the attention of the signers.

In illustration of myinvention I have shown in the drawings, Figures 1 and 2, su'fficient portions of a pension-voucher, which has to be signed in many places by two or more classes of signers, although, of course, I do not wish to be understood as limiting my invention to its application to pension-vouchers, but, on the other hand, distinctly include as within my invention all classes of documentary blanks which have to be signed at different places by different classes of signers-as, for instance, principal and witnesses.

Assuming that the voucher shown in the drawings is well-known to those having occasion to use such vouchers, I will explain my invention as applied thereto.

In the first place, then, I placein prominent position upon the blank voucher-for example, at the headthe Warning statement that witnesses are to sign at the places covered in, for example, pink, and that the principal is to sign on the places covered by blue, and in order further to arrest attention I not only print the words Pink and Blue, but adjacent to such words I also print blocks of corresponding colors. Wherever witnesses are to sign on the blank the color set opposite that class of signers appears prominently, and so, also, wherever the principal is to sign that place or those places is or are prominently marked with the appropriate color.

.The two classes being distinct and dissimilar and appealing at once to the eye reduce the liability of mistakes to the minimum. The importance of providing not only these legal documents, but many others, with indieia serving to minimize the liability of mistakes of signers cannot be overestimated and will be recognized at the mere suggestion.

If a document is to be signed by more than two classes of persons, of course acorresponding number of different colors would be employed.

Prior to this invention it has been customary to provide bonds, checks, and other men etary instruments with colored portions on whiclrto write the amount of the instrument in order to prevent or minimize the possibility of raising or altering such instruments. So, also, postal-cards and other postal devices have been provided with colored lines to serve as guides for purposes of address. Colors have been variously used for different purposes as indicia of facts or things; but so far as I am aware it is original with me to provide a documentary blank that is to be signed by different classes of persons with colored indicia as to the places of signature of the respective classes of signers.

\Vhat I claim as my invention is 1. A documentary blank having the places for signatures indicated by different colors spread over such places, whereby the respect ive places for signatures are plainly exhibited and designated, substantially as described.

2. A rlocumeutary blank having the places for signatures indicated by different colors spread over such places and explanations on the blank of the meanings of the colors to guide the signers both visually and by direct instruction in the proper execution of the document, substantially as described.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand this 9th day of February, A.D.1891.

EDWARD A. DUBEY.

IVitnesses:

JAMES W. WEBB, WILLIAM 0. PLUM. 

